Emerging Trends - Worship In America

Recent research has shown that there are some significant patterns or trends emerging in how American churches conduct their worship services. 

More traditional elements such as organs, bulletins, and choirs seem to be giving way to more modern and youthful expressions such as spoken amens, raising hands during worship, and using projection equipment for song lyrics and sermon notes.

These and many other findings were included in the latest National Congregations Study (NCS) covering all religious congregations. The study also suggested a trend away from the decades-old emphasis on belief and doctrine and toward an emphasis on experience, emotion, and less general denominational bias.

Sarah Zylstras report on these findings was recently published in Christianity Today and described as the 'waning of the worship wars'. Findings are as follows in three categories  Dropped trends, rising ones and those remaining steady:

Dropped - traditional service elements.

" Using organs, bulletins, and choirs  by 10 percent. It is noteworthy that the use of organs decreased significantly only among evangelical congregations whereas fewer choirs were found only in larger evangelical and mainline Protestant congregations.

" The numbers of worship services held to accommodate different worship styles. Churches are nowadays less likely to separate their services by traditional and contemporary worship styles. The current differences seem to be defined by levels of formality and styles of music.

" Congregations that arent affiliated with a denomination  by about 6 percent.

Up - more informal elements are on the rise. 

" Saying amen spontaneously in the worship service - 6 percent

" Speaking in tongues  mainly in charismatic churches  6 percent

" Hearing testimony from members - 7 percent

" Jumping or shouting  - 8 percent

" Applause - 10 percent

" Raising hands and using drums - 14 percent. It is noteworthy that more raising of hands occurred only in evangelical and mainline Protestant congregations.

" Use of projection equipment - 23 percent.

Steady  no significant change.

" The use of electric guitars has remained steady, according to a new survey from Faith Communities Today (FCT) - nearly 35 percent.

In Zylstra's opinion, a wider acceptance of Pentecostal-style worship is what is giving praise bands and informal practices the upper hand. She also supposes that the shrinking number of more formal worship styles is reflected in the overall decline of mainline and Catholic congregations.

An additional and more likely factor is the general comfort with informality in church settings where congregants tend to feel less constrained to act formally than in official settings such as work and business.

Peter Smith, in a recent article for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, would likely agree with the view that many churches are informal in style and approach to worship. He recalls  a couple of recent services in which each featured high-energy, guitar-led worship with lyrics projected onto screens, and each was using a rented space originally designed for entertainment.

Observations made by Smith would perhaps explain what has replaced the NCS-noted trend in which multiple services with different styles of worship is dropping. These multiple services have been replaced, at least in part, by single services spread among various affiliated locations.

Smith quotes a recent survey which found that nearly two-thirds of Americas largest churches now have multiple addresses. "More congregations are opting not to build bigger buildings but to do multisite", said one of the researchers, Scott Thumma, at the Hartford Institute for Religion Research in Connecticut.

Despite the NCS findings, another independent research finding suggests that despite the changes in many of Americas worship services, many more churches view adaptation much more skeptically. This view is espoused by Jeff Brumley in a recent account published for baptistnews.com.  

Brumley made reference to David A. Roozens Hartford Institute for Religion Research survey titled "American Congregations 2015: Thriving and Surviving" that was released early January. Brumley quoted George Bullard, a church consultant and strategic coordinator of the Columbia Partnership in South Carolina whose view on at least one aspect of the report was positive.

Bullard's view is that the willingness to innovate in worship can be the kick-starter for improvements in a churchs spiritual health and its numeric increase, allowing them a way "to not be like every other church on the block". "Worship innovation leads to spiritual growth" and "discipleship growth will influence and inspire worship", added Bullard.

All indications remain that these trends will be good and positive for Christian worship services  so long as Biblical belief, doctrine and standards are not compromised. Rather, these must form the scriptural basis for all worship styles and approaches in all denominations.